BLOGSPOT URLs REDIRECT - Based on Country of the viewer.

Blogspot URLs Redirect - Based on Country of the viewer.

Suddenly I saw the change in the URLs of blog in Google Blogspot. The blogs with the URL structure of "blogname.blogspot.com" are redirecting to blogname.blogspot.in to visitor in India, and blogname.blogspot.com.au to visitor in Australia, and so on.

Like any other SEO professional, my first reaction was to find out will this anyhow effect my blog, its ranking, the crawling from spiders, uploading speed or any other factor ? Below is the list of few things that I have noted while knowing about the change, and would like to share them with you.

1. What is the big change?

• You may have already noticed, or will come to see over the coming weeks, that the URL of a blog you're reading has been redirected to a country-code top level domain, or "ccTLD."
• A ccTLD, when it appears, corresponds with the country of the reader’s current location.
• The change doesn't produce any other visible differences to the blog other than the URL redirecting to a ccTLD.

2. What is the reason for this change?

• The main reason why Google implemented country-specific redirection is selective censorship.
• The Google can now easily block a blog, or a particular page on a blog, in one country if they have any issue with the visibility of that page or blog in their country. But the blog or the page still can be access in other countries.
• This migration to localized domains will allow the Google Blogspot to continue promoting free expression and responsible publishing while providing greater flexibility in complying with valid removal requests pursuant to local law.
• By utilizing ccTLDs, content removals can be managed on a per country basis, which will limit their impact to the smallest number of readers.
• Content removed due to a specific country’s law will only be removed from the relevant ccTLD.

3. What is the effect on SEO?

Surprise.....

• Now crawlers will find your Blogspot content on many different domains.
• Content in multiple domains means delicacy of the content & hosting duplicate content on different domains can affect search results. Because Google was against it.
• But relax; Google is working to minimize any negative consequences of hosting Blogspot content on multiple domains.
• The majority of content hosted on different domains will be unaffected by content removals, and therefore identical. For all such content, there will be the "blogspot.com" version as the canonical version using rel=canonical.
• This will let crawlers know that although the URLs are different, the content is the same. When a post or blog in a country is affected by a content removal, the canonical URL will be set to that country’s ccTLD instead of the .com version.
• This will ensure that the Blog, or the Blogger, is not creating multiple content with same canonical tag.

4. What is NCR

• NCR stands for “No Country Redirect”
• The use of "/NCR" at the end of your URL in the browser can get you rid from the redirects
• For example: http://[blogname].blogspot.com/ncr – always goes to the U.S. English blog.
• This special URL sets a short-lived cookie (session and/or a short life time) that will prevent geo-based redirection from the requested domain. This applies to all web browsers and all Operating Systems.
• This can only stop the redirects at your system, for the short duration.

5. What are different country-code top level domain, or "ccTLD" ?

• Your Blogs can now be visites using all these ccTLD:

US and Globe - ..blogspot.com

Argentina - ..blogspot.com.ar

Australia - ..blogspot.com.au

Brazil - ..blogspot.com.br

Canada - ..blogspot.ca

France - ..blogspot.fr

Germany - ..blogspot.de

India - ..blogspot.in

Italy - ..blogspot.it

Japan - ..blogspot.jp

Mexico - ..blogspot.mx

New Zealand - ..blogspot.co.nz

Portugal - ..blogspot.pt

UK - ..blogspot.co.uk

Spain - ..blogspot.com.es

Sweden - ..blogspot.se

6. What if I want to stop the Redirect?

Incase you do not like the "idea" of URL redirect, there are remedies for that too. Here is a script that will again redirect your blog to ".com" once it changes to the country specific domain. But this will increase the loading time by fraction of a second.

• Log in to your Google Account
• Go to Blogger Dashboard
• Go to template of the Blogspot you wish should not redirect.
• Click "Edit HTML" option.
• Paste the following code in "Head section" i.e. after "" and before "".
• This script will force-redirect the visitor to the blogspot.com address using the '/ncr' switch.

<script type="text/javascript">

var blog = document.location.hostname;

var slug = document.location.pathname;

var ctld = blog.substr(blog.lastIndexOf("."));

if (ctld != ".com") {

var ncr = "http://" + blog.substr(0, blog.indexOf("."));

ncr += ".blogspot.com/ncr" + slug;

window.location.replace(ncr);

}

</script>

For any Website promotion or Internet marketing related query, Please contact:
Prateek Samuel
Asst. Manager - Operations
Rainmaker Interactive Pvt. Ltd. (Himshilp: Internet Marketing Consultants)
www.himshilp.com

Facebook Timeline - the basics by Raninmaker

FACEBOOK is about to change the entire look - the personal profile page and the business page to the Timeline platform. The facility is currently available as an option for the user. But soon they will execute the Timeline platform to all the pages, weather you want it or not.

There are blogs and articles about how people feel about this major change in Facebook. Half of them welcome the changes and see them as improvement in the business strategy framework, to market their profiles. Whereas the other half criticize Facebook, for forcing their mere "cosmetic change" to be adopted. My view to the scenario is that if we think Facebook has developed a successful platform so far for social interaction, they will not do something just for the sake of changing. There must be tones of thought processes that have taken place in 'Facebook Management' before they propose a change like this. A company like Facebook cannot do something overnight, when its CEO is drunk :) Just kidding, there is nothing personal Mr. Zuckerberg . But yes, he may not do this again (at least).

Here is this blog I will try to put down some points that will make us all feel that the new design - Timeline - is not too complicate to use. We as Social Media Marketers, have use more rigid websites like "ORKUT" and "My Space" to get among the people (Again, just trying to be funny, I don't hate ORKUT / My Space :), believe me this time atleast). So, we can use the new AVATAR of Facebook as well.

What do I get from TIMELINE ?

Before proceeding any further, let us see what is there in TIMELINE which will really benefit me or my Business Page.

1. TIMELINE Cover Photo:

The most important Real-estate for any web presence. The Cover Photo will be there at the top of the business page, covering 850 pixels by 315 pixels of your screen.

2. Tabs and Application:

You can choose your Tabs and Application to be displayed ('Photos' is a permanent application; you can opt for 3 more tabs / applications to display just below the cover photo. These tabs and applications appearances can be customized, i.e. you can choose names and display images of your choices.

3. Pin and Highlight:

Brands can Pin their favorite posts and messages to get highlighted at the top - "above the fold messages".

Above points must have raised your eyebrows if you are in online marketing for a while. Because then you know what does it really means to have something in first 25% of the page. This area gets the first and most of the attention. A right cover photo, display of tabs and applications and the most important post highlighted on top can help any viewer, whether he or she is landed on the right page or not.

How to handle elements of TIMELINE?

Now let us get some basics right, on how to handle some elements to make our page marketable.

I. COVER PHOTO - TIMELINE

Almost 95% of the websites, I visited, have a banner at the top of their website's home page, covering a huge horizontal portion. This is so done to create an image about the website for the viewers. It’s not to exaggerate if I say, this picture can really convey 'thousand' words. The image must be a minimum of 399 pixels across to be used as the cover photo. The cover photo maximum dimensions are 850 pixels by 315 pixels.

The Facebook allows you to either directly upload an image from your computer, or you can make a selection out of your collections in "Photos" section. Once you upload the image, you will get an option to adjusting the image so to make sure that a viewer is getting the correct visual.

Do Not Cross the Lines

This Cover Photo cannot have any "Call to Action". Do not have text which says

- Like Us
- Share with your friends
- Call me @
- Email me @
- Skype me @
- My Website URL, etc.

II. THUMBNAIL - TIMELINE

In older business pages, we need to select a portion out of our profile image to be there as 'thumbnail' whenever we create a post. With new Timeline, you can simply have a separate file for this purpose. This profile picture can have dimension of 180 pixels X 180 Pixels, and the thumbnail will then be corped based on 30 pixel X 30 pixel selections from the profile picture.

III. SHOWCASE THE POST - TIMELINE

The Timeline has better features to showcase your picture and the videos uploaded. They appear much louder in compare to the older look.

Even the posts can be selected to highlight. You can select the post that you think should not be missed by any of your fans-followers. To highlight the post, click the star icon at the top right hand side of the selected post. This will make your post spans all the way across the TIMELINE.

A new feature of PIN has been developed by the Facebook TIMELINE. This feature enables a post to stay at the top of your TIMELINE for maximum duration of a week. Market your offer, discount & limited period deals, make more people to give clicks to your link for free stuff or report downloads, or simply make sure that all your fans are aware of the contest & polls running by you during that particular duration. With a "PIN" to your most important post, you do not have to worry about new posts bringing down the effectiveness of the other posts.

NOTE:

1. The “Star” option above the post makes you HIGHLIGHT the post.

2. The “pencil” icon above the post has an option to PIN the post

IV. TABS AND APPLICATIONS - TIMELINE

One of the biggest changes that Facebook introduces with TIMELINE is the removal of the default custom landing page. The tabs created as landing pages or 'Welcome' tabs are not going to be vanished from your Facebook. Now visitors are going to land on your TIMELINE page only. Those other FBML pages, special applications, custom tabs, which you have created in the past are going to be there with your business page. You can access them below the right side of Cover Image.

You can now showcase 12 of your applications associated with your business page, and can make selected tabs / applications to display prominently below the cover image.

There is a space to display 4 tabs / application to get below the Cover Image. Out of which "Photo" is the default tab, so you can choose 3 more, based on where you want your viewer to get engage.

To get your tabs / applications among the first four displayed ones,

- Select the applications under the Cover Image.

- Point the tab / application you want to move to the top.
- Click the 'pencil' icon in the top right corner.

- Select the tab / application that you want to interchange position with.

V. TABS AND APPLICATIONS - 2 - TIMELINE

It’s not yet over with Tabs and Application. Facebook understands that these Tabs and Applications

You can Name your Tabs and Applications of your choice. If this is not what you are impressed about, then you can now have a personalized image for your tabs and applications. You can imagine what a "50% OFF" image can do to your shopping cart on Facebook. are the best marketing tools for your business page. You have spent time and efforts in creating them so that your fans can get engage with your brand. This made Facebook to come up with a 'Hats-Off' idea to promote these tabs and applications with better visual effects.

To name & provide image to your tabs / applications

- Select the applications under the Cover Image.
- Point the tab / application you want to move to the top.
- Click the 'pencil' icon in the top right corner.
- Select the tab / application that you want to interchange position with.
- Click to "Edit Setting"

- Name the tab or upload the image of your choice.

Do let me know if you think there are more which I need to include here in this article, as a Social media marketing profession.

Rules to monitor Social Media – Where is the Democracy ???

Kapil Sibal, India’s acting telecommunications minister has reported to ask, on behave of Indian government, social media sites like Facebook to prescreen user content from India and to remove disparaging, inflammatory or defamatory content before it goes online. (source - http://india.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/12/05/india-asks-google-facebook-others-to-screen-user-content/).

The main issue was said to be a Facebook page speaking against the Congress Party’s president, Sonia Gandhi. He told the Internet Marketing companies representatives to screen the content manually and not by using technology. Let me remind you the person who is highlighting manual use over the technology is representing a nation like India in Telecommunication industry.

This is not the first time when a country wants to screen the user generated content. US with their copyright holders issue and China with its objective to avoid pornography in their respective country has previously made similar requests with the Internet Companies. But these countries are doing this with a clear-cut purpose in their mind. The purpose that promises growth, not of an individual, but of a whole community. But the reason provided be Mr. Kapil Sibal was merely focusing on a political party. And above all how can one forget that India is said to be a biggest Democratic nation.

The Google transparency report shows that India has already raised 68 removal requests for disputed contents.

This clearly shows that “The Right of Expression” comes with an asterisk symbol (*) - *Condition Apply. Unless and until what you are expressing is being liked by the political party in Rule you are not supposed to do that.

Social Media Measurement and Monitoring

We are in the age of Networking. Social Media is no more an evolving platform to reach people. Most of the online companies have realized the power possessed by Facebook and Twitter, and they are already successfully making sales and getting business leads through such channels. With large amount of corporate money is on stake, the Social media measurement and monitoring reports have become the essential component to keep an eye on the ROI made.

Many companies come up with statements that measuring social media ROI is not possible. Well, it is not a straightforward job, as it is for E-mail marketing, Pay per click advertising campaign and Search Engine Optimization i.e. SEO of a website. This is so, because the concept behind the social media is not the same as the other. Let us look into this first.

SOCIAL MEDIA – the Concept

While all the other channels focus on generating new business, and getting leads, the social media is used with a primary focus on developing bonds and relationship. The relationship could be between person-to-person, business-to-business, person-to-business and brand-to-person. While the prior is meant to establish yourself as better salesperson, the later is to establish yourself as a contributor to the society.

Hence, a mere selling pitch in social media is not a successful path. In other words, Social media is not about acquisition, but retention.

Engagement is the KEY

Engagement is the only reason of why Social media is so popular. People want to get out of daily sales pitch they listen to. They want to discuss their problems, not the products available in the market. And want their trusted circle to suggest a solution to their problem. That solution can be a product and services available in the market. But again people do not want a salesman in their social media contact list. Hence, all you have to do is to provide a solution.

Interact with the people, help them in finding solutions, educate them about your category, answer to their queries, and you will find that you are becoming their trusted resource. Over time you can become the expert on the subject, among the viewers. They will respect your comments, and will respond accordingly.

And at that point of time, if any one of them looking for the vendors providing likewise services and products as yours, you will be in their priority list. Also, if there is someone seeking for your services in their contact list, they will be marketing for you, and that too for free.

So how to calculate the ROI in Social Media?

In social media, the ROI can be look as ROC i.e. Return on Conversation. If someone is responding to you, liking what you say, sharing your ideas, discussing with you and seeking for your next comments by following you, they are your returns.

Hence, In Social Media.
Specifically in - Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.
The only thing that is worth measuring is - "Engagement". All we have to do is to use the engagement while creating social media measurement and monitoring reports.

Parameters for ROI in Social Media

Below are different parameters that can be tracked from time to time to know whether your investments in social media is in right direction or not. These can be used as the elements for the social media measurement and monitoring reports

FACEBOOK

1. LIKE
2. Comments
3. Replies / Discussion
4. Participation in POLLS
5. Page Views / Unique page view
6. Post Views
7. New Users / Fans
8. Demographic - Gender / Age / Countries / Cities

TWITTER

1. Followers
2. ReTweets

LINKEDIN

1. Comments
2. Replies
3. Connections

For any Website promotion or Internet marketing services related query, Please contact:
Prateek Samuel
Asst Manager - Operations
Himshilp: Internet Marketing Consultants / Rainmaker Interactive Pvt. Ltd.
www.himshilp.com

Outsourcing Web promotion Services to India

Outsourcing Web promotion Services to India

In India, there are many professionals who handle outsourced web promotions from different parts of the world. The advantages of outsourcing web promotion services to India, where there is a large pool of IT professionals, are tremendous as it not only saves infrastructure cost and time but also permits the clients to use that time to gain more business. The client also gets easy communicating environment as English is used as the standard language for business. Outsourcing web promotion services to India help you in huge cost reduction as you don't have to invest in staff, infrastructure, training etc..

The edge above all, an offshore web promotion company in India, like us, can provide extremely high quality solutions for internet marketing without charging for a planet.

Advantages in hiring an offshore web promotion company in India

1. Low Cost
In countries like US, UK and Canada, prices paid to any professional firm is very high. Also, creating and maintaining in-house teams for the all activities costs too much. Then why not to choose the experts in the field if they are available at relatively low-cost.

2. Result Oriented
Companies offering any sort of offshore services will always be looking for good references globally. Thus result is the primary concern for their operations. In India, the completion in the IT sector pushes the vendors to go extra miles with their clients.

3. Zonal Advantage
There is time difference which companies can utilize to their benefits. All they have to do is to tell their requirements before leaving their offices. The next day they can see the changes and respond. This way you are making the system continuous. Your operations are not affected when you are not there in the office.

Why is Offshore web promotion services in NECESSARY

Web promotion and marketing becomes very essential with the increase in online competition. You can spend as much as you can to give your website a great look but it is not worth a dime if your potential customers cannot find it for the keywords related to the services or product you are offering. While designing a website the idea is communicated in terms of creativity and requirement of the fact how you want people to look at your business. You can design for fun, for pure information, or to provide a excellent buying experience. But when it comes to promoting, everything boils down to getting right clicks for the right keywords. Also once the website design is over, the owner always wants to see the responses from the real people. He may be tight with the budget, or want to see some sort of results before moving forward from here. This makes offshore web promotion services extremely valuable for your business.

About Rainmaker Interactive Pvt. Ltd. – A pioneer outsourse web promotion company, India

Rainmaker Interactive Pvt. Ltd., is an outsource web promotion company based in Bangalore India, providing professional services in outsource SEO Solutions, offshore PPC Management Services and Social Media Marketing for global clients. We offer you integrated solutions for offshore web promotions that will help you to communicate your ideas to the potential customers.

To outsource your SEO services, PPC management services and Social Media Marketing, please contact
Prateek Samuel

Asst. Manager - Operations
Himshilp: Internet Marketing Consultants / Rainmaker Interactive Pvt. Ltd.
www.himshilp.com

SEO has the biggest impact on lead generation

SEO has been again appeared as the most important way to generate leads. The survey was conducted by Webmarketing123, a California-based online marketing agency.

The company surveyed more than 500 U.S. online marketers in August and September.

The results show that while lead generation and sales are the top two most important objectives of digital marketing, SEO makes the biggest impact on lead generation across the board.

Summary from the Report Generating Leads has been selected as the most important objective behind digital marketing programs – by 46.4% of the total B2B companies participated. Whereas For B2C companies, 39.9% opted for generating sales as the most important objective) Website traffic has been selected unbiased as the leading measuring tool for success in digital marketing program. 57% of B2B marketers and 41% of B2C marketers credit SEO as their primary source for generating leads to their business; followed by PPC and Social Media respectively. No one surprised when Facebook emerged as the Number 1 choice for the social media across all the participants. But amazingly the number goes to 73% when it comes to lead generation using Facebook by B2C marketers. As expected, B2B marketers invest one-third of their digital budgets on SEO activities, while B2C marketers invest mostly in PPC. The most important of all, the report reveals an interesting trend that marketers in both the categories are planning to increase their budget in 2012 with Social Media.

Other facts to know

- More companies likely to outsource PPC than SEO

- 84.8% keep social media marketing in-house

- Website traffic is the primary way they measure the success of online marketing efforts.

Source - http://go.webmarketing123.com/seland-state-of-digital-marketing-report.html

Google offering free websites / domains.

Google to offer free websites and domain to India. According to Google it is an initiative to help small and medium business (SMBs) in India to go online.

Long back Microsoft distributed its Window free for years, and let it become a part of every operation on computer. Its always been a long term strategy to dominate the market by providing something for free. Once you become popular and necessity in market, start selling your add-ons.

Google is providing its domain for free, for one year only. Then from 2nd year they will charge a nominal free, trust it is going to be very low from their competitors.

Moreover, Domains from Google has better chances for getting index, and being crawled regularly. So no one will have any issue in paying Google, what they are asking for.

But what is there for the existing websites / domains. They have worked for years to exist online. They have struggled a lot with every change in Google algorithm. Will all this hard work is consider as of second priority and a domain from Google is the primary for ranking????

For answer we have to wait and see if Google can maintain their policy of transparency well enough with time......

Source - http://ibnlive.in.com/news/google-offers-indian-businesses-free-websites/198516-11.html

For any Website promotion or Internet marketing services related query, Please contact:
Prateek Samuel
Asst Manager - Operations
Himshilp: Internet Marketing Consultants / Rainmaker Interactive Pvt. Ltd.
www.himshilp.com